These may be a bit rarified, but probably the best place to start is "Shiryo ni Yoru Nihon no Ayumi." This has a good overview of sources for the Tokugawa period, both primary and secondary.
Along with consulting the works cited, you probably should familiarize yourself with the Chu Hsi or the neo-Confucian movement, which Tsunayoshi was a major force behind. This was also the period of the 47 Ronin and you might want to check out some of the historical sources and commentaries on this famous play.
Probably the most accessable source of the period of Tsunayoshi's reign would be the well-known memoirs of Engelbert Kaempfer, a Dutch trader who was one of the few people who got see what was happening in Japan outside Nagasaki.
From the Japanese side, I can only think that Arai Hakuseki's memoirs might be useful.
As always, my favorite general history of Japan is George Sansom's Three vol history from the beginning of time through the Meiji Resotration. There is a brief overview of Tsunayoshi's career at the beginning of chapter XI.
I hope this is a help to you. I would be interested in hearing what others might have to say about these sources.
Gillian Rubinstein <
gillian@...> wrote:
>
> Hi,
> firstly i am after literature- published workd, or websites-
containing
> information on the life of Tokugawa Tsunayoshi (1680-1709). The
fifth
> Tokugawa Shogun.
Have been waiting to see if anyone else would answer this as I also find
Tsunayoshi a fascinating character and would like to know more about
him. Marius Jansen writes a bit about him in The Making of Modern
Japan (Harvard UP 2002) "in this case, birth from a plebeian (but highly
intelligent and famously beautiful) mother and an independent
upbringing that was not geared for heading the bakufu produced a
strong-willed and intelligent, albeit idiosyncratic, shogun."
Jansen's sources are: Donald Shively "Tokugawa Tsuyanoshi, the
Genroku Shogun' in Craig and Shively "Personality in Japanese History
and
Beatrice Bodart-Bailey "The Laws of Compassion" in Mon Nip 40/2
Jansen is very good, in the same book, on the Genroku period, and has
some information on the Shoheiko Academy, the bakufu school,
though he does not indicate that this was founded by Tsunayoshi.
I guess for insights into contemporary culture the plays of Chikamatsu
would be invaluable. Donald Shively has written on this too.
There is also a very good book called Edo Culture by Nishiyama
Matsunosuke (U of Hawaii Press 1997). It has all sorts of interesting
information on food, cooking, travel, theatre and music, and so on. Not
many references to Tsunayoshi but one of them tells of the Kashima
Oracle's denunciation of the dog kennels and bad policies of the Dog
Shogun.
There must be lots of Japanese biographies of him - maybe even a
taiga :)
please post any other information that you've discovered.
Thanks,
Gillian
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